Official Swiss Bank Denials Of SNB/Fed Dollar Swap Line Usage Sends Gold To New Record Just $120 Away From $2000

When we first presented yesterday that the SNB had used $200 million in FX swaps with the New York Fed, we speculated that this "means that it is not some usual PIIGS suspect, but one of the two "big ones." Obviously by this we meant Credit Suisse or UBS. It took the banks about 12 hours to come out and deny officially that it had been either of them. Well, it simply it is someone else, and hence someone with far less in deposit-based capital buffers. And then, of course, you know what they say about official denials... Anyway, whoever it was, Europe is not waiting to find out: this morning most European bourses are down between 2 and 4%, Dax down 3.7%, CAC down 2.8% and the FTSE down 2.8% at last check, as the specter of a pan-European bank run is back. The net result: spam continues to be a drag in the gold-canned food pair trade, hitting a new old time high of $1878 in the spot market minutes ago, and just $122 away from $2000. Should the market rout persist, we may well see $2000 in the next 48 market hours.

From Reuters:

Switzerland's biggest bank UBS (UBSN.VX) (UBS.N) said on Friday it had not made use of the Federal Reserve's swap facility via the Swiss National Bank.

There had been speculation that a Swiss bank had accessed the U.S. liquidity facility via a $200 million repurchase transaction with the SNB the previous week.

"UBS has not made use of the Fed facility through the SNB," it said in a statement.

The Federal Reserve provided $200 million of liquidity to the Swiss National Bank in the latest week via its swap lines for foreign central banks, the New York Fed said on Thursday.

The SNB was the sole institution to tap the swap lines in the week ended August 17, swapping the full amount.

That was the first time the SNB has tapped the swap lines since they were reopened in May 2010.